Monday, December 31, 2012

Hey folks! Sorry about the whole long time no post, but work has been hectic as of late. That coupled with a house full of kids, holidays and everything else this blog has taken a back-back burner.

On with the subject at hand!

I recently acquired a Nikon D800. What a wonderful piece of machinery! I'll speak more about that later in the future when I get some more time behind it. But in the process I lost a D700 to a fellow NSOP'er and a D7000 (which I wasn't really using anyways). I'll really miss the D700.

But my style of shooting and due to the weight of good glass I feel like i really benefit from a grip on a body. I had a 3rd party on my previous D300's and D700. Zeikios I believe. I had nothing but a good experience with them other than feeling a little bit of flex between the body and camera with something like a 70-200 or the 14-24 on board. I really didn't see the point in shelling out a lot of money when there is something that is less than half the price and almost, if not just as good.

I got my D800 and thought I might not get a grip with it. But after shooting a little around the house and at a local middle school basketball game I decided I was wrong.

There are quite a few options these days for 3rd party grips (BHPhoto, Adorama, Ebay). Something at Adorama struck my eye. It was out of stock at the time (and took about 2 months to get here) but it claimed to be a 3rd party grip for the D800 and was made of Magnesium alloy and it cost $110.

Well it is here and so far, so good. There isn't a lot to say about it other than it looks good, performs well and fit/finish is pretty good. The following little section contains a short little video (I'm not great at video nor speaking. Go easy on me!) and a few pictures from my iPhone that show some of the details and highlight my little gripes.

Video:

Pictures and description:

Installed on the D800.

Side view. You can see the Nikon rubber detail here and the texture on the grip body.

(note small issue with fit tolerances where grip meets body)

Grip Shutter/Lock button and Aperture Wheel

Nikon D800 Shutter/Lock button for reference and to show the camera's texture.

Bottom of grip

Once again, slight tolerances off where grip meets body. No real issue but I figured I'd show it.

It is hard to see here, but if you hold the camera up to a light source you can see a bit of light "peeking through" the space between the grip and body. Not an issue because of the gasket around the electrical contacts on the plate side of the grip. If the camera did manage to get splashed I'd be sure to take the grip off and wipe it down so I wouldn't go crazy thinking about it. Come to think of it, I think you should probably do this regardless of what grip you are running when you get home.

One more shot of the issue. (Note: it is the gap in the upper left. The gaps on the right are where light shines through the lock down wheel)

Overall, I like it. I think it will work well for me in the future and I will update this if any issues were to develop.

Like I said in the video, I think the value is here. I can think of a lot of other things to spend the money I saved on this (Lee 10-stopper??). However, I am not so sure that I am any better off with the metal version over the cheaper plastic version.

Pleas let me know if this was helpful. If you have further questions I'll do my best to answer them in a timely manner.

If none of this was relevant to your interests, you may still leave some love!